


Liars

by Katuary



Series: Thunder and Lightning [7]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Blue-Purple Hawke (Dragon Age), Dragon Age II Quest - Justice, Emotional Manipulation, F/M, Heavy Angst, Implied Sexual Content, Post-Dragon Age II Quest - Justice, Unhealthy Relationships, Warrior Hawke (Dragon Age)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-14 15:35:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29298267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katuary/pseuds/Katuary
Summary: Drakestone and sela petrae. Hawke pretended she didn't know better.
Relationships: Anders/Female Hawke
Series: Thunder and Lightning [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1477754
Comments: 4
Kudos: 6





	Liars

**Author's Note:**

> CW: emotional manipulation

Drakestone and sela petrae. Hawke pretended she didn't know better. 

Everything Anders said to her that morning was too good to be true. He was never so vague about potion making, even though she lacked the expertise to follow his explanations exactly. Besides, after his descriptions, she knew the items he'd asked her to retrieve with him were hardly standard healing ingredients.

She brought no one else with them on their harvest. They would never have kept quiet. 

Quiet. She hardly spoke a word as they moved through the tunnels beneath Darktown, and he didn't object. He was single-minded, breaking his monotone only when she fell to a pack of bandits taking them by surprise. She didn't have time for more than a muffled shout, and distantly heard him scream.

Desperate screaming was so much better than fake smiles and empty promises. If only it lasted past dispatching the bandits and healing the dual stab wounds in her back. She had only been stunned; she was lucky they'd missed anything vital.

 _You’re all right, love._ A single, too-brief, gentle touch. Clinically affectionate. _I’m sorry._

After, there was little but Justice. A spirit wearing the face of the man she loved. Nearly worse than Tranquility, since she could still see glimpses of Anders beneath. 

She shivered in the late winter chill, grateful her welling eyes could be blamed on the wind as they hiked to the recently abandoned Bone Pit. Not that Justice would notice.

Hawke thought it would be over after they gathered what he needed, that she could go home and scream into her pillow until she lost her voice, sob in the tub with the door locked, anything so long as no one asked what she'd done. 

No. He needed her to talk to, to _distract_ , Elthina. 

Whatever shred of hope she'd clung to before was destroyed in that final request. She searched his eyes for any uncertainty, anything she could use to convince him, but the warmth in them was false now. Flat, flickering, making a puppet of him. Desperation and determination she'd only seen matched in the eyes of cultists she'd fought. 

She had smiled with false reassurance, unsure for whom it was meant. _I won't desert you now._

The relief on his face in return was nearly too much to bear. _I don't deserve your love._

It didn't matter. She couldn't lose what was left of him. 

The click of the lock when they finally returned home felt like punctuation, absolute. Hawke ignored Bodahn's jovial greeting and pushed her way upstairs, loosening bits of armor as she went. She hesitated at the top of the stairs and looked down. 

Anders hadn't followed her. 

She snarled in raw frustration and stalked her way back down the stairs, tossing her gauntlets carelessly to the side as she went. She strode purposefully through the library, through the hall that led past the servants' quarters and kitchen, to the still-cracked door of the cellar. Hawke threw the door the rest of the way open to find Anders squatting precariously, halfway through unlocking the trap door in the floor. His face held the slightest sign of guilt when he looked up, but she only glared.

"Where, exactly, are you going?"

"I've been gone all day." He had the audacity to shrug. His hands stayed fixed on the brass key. "I should see if I'm needed at the clinic."

" _No_."

He blinked. "No?"

"After today, you..." She meant to demand he stay again. But her anger was so foreign with family that she could only shudder a resigned sigh. "Please. I need..." She clicked her teeth harshly, refusing to shed further tears in front of him. _For_ him, though he hadn't noticed a single instance that day. She shook her head and turned for the hallway, bracing herself for another night alone, but his hand caught hers.

"What do you need, love?" 

The fleeting warmth in his voice charged her desperation. 

"You. Just until I fall asleep." Why did it feel like begging? He'd be gone again in the morning. Perhaps she could convince herself to be furious instead of terrified by then.

She wished she could say she was unsure who moved first, but it was her. Always her, for longer than she could clearly remember, reaching for him since she knew he would never reach for her first. Not anymore. Not unless he needed her.

Their mouths crashed together clumsily, Hawke feeding all her fear into a single kiss. She backed him into the door jamb, and his fingers dug hard into her hair. She swallowed a sob and released it as a moan.

She could lose herself in this.  
  
Her tears slipped into their kiss. She was sure he could taste the salt of them, but he said nothing. His hands moved from her hair to the back of her neck, both their frenzied touches ebbing to gentleness simultaneously.

They broke apart, foreheads resting together. Hawke kept her eyes tightly shut and reached for his hand. "Upstairs," she murmured, "Are you coming?"

Anders inclined his head against hers, just slightly, and she curled her fingers into his to lead him from the room. The gesture evoked the memory of his first night with her, though she led him this time rather than meeting his gaze. If the warmth was already gone, if he was merely waiting her out again, she didn't want to know.

A handful of hours to pretend she'd forgotten. Physical closeness though he felt miles away. She thought he might still be plotting, even in their bedroom, even inside her, and she shoved the thought aside roughly with all the other doubts she couldn't afford.

After, she fought sleep as she clung to him. She lost. Hawke woke to an empty bed, curled in on herself, and fell to pieces once more, alone in the dark.

**Author's Note:**

> _While you were out building other worlds, where was I?  
>  Where's that man who'd throw blankets over my barbed wire?  
> I made you my temple, my mural, my sky  
> Now I'm begging for footnotes in the story of your life  
> _
> 
> Ah, angsty Taylor Swift lyrics, you'll never let me down. Act 3 is, obviously, the hardest part of the Anders romance. And I love the opportunity to call him out on his manipulative bullshit, but I'm not convinced my Hawke would take it. What if doing so pushed one more person away?
> 
> PS: if you ever want to get deep in an Anders Angst mood, listen to _Liar_ by the Arcadian Wild. Not the direct inspiration of the title/story here since it’s a Hawke POV, but you will cry. Sorry/you’re welcome in advance. 
> 
> PPS: I always wind up doing this quest super early in Act 3, so this probably takes place, say, a month or so before the end of the game.
> 
> PPPS: Okay, where the ever-loving Void is the cellar in the Hawke estate? I feel like we're missing at least another half of the house, or else where would Bodahn, Sandal, and Orana stay? Where's the kitchen? I'm taking some small liberties with layout, but close enough for government work (and certainly close enough for _Kirkwall_ government work.


End file.
